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WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

arstechnica.com

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Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#281

Post by tharne »

annadane wrote: post #277
Lammy wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WhatsApp was an existential threat to Facebook in every country besides the US. They had the data to prove it, obtained from real users via FB's Onavo VPN service. Facebook Messenger 3.0 was to WhatsApp as Google+ was to Facebook (the product), and when the usage numbers weren't going the right way they gave up and bought them out before the gulf got even wider. Textual messaging is a low-data-use (accessible to the…

Does it never occur to them to say "Maybe the reason we're under attack is people want more privacy and control"? Not double down and take away people's options?

Zuckerberg is a Utopian. Like all Utopians he sees any disagreement as the other party being too stupid to see what's good for them, so they only rational answer is to force them to do "what's best".

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#284

Post by soupson »

This is some mafia shit. They're holding users data hostage behind a click-through acceptance of their altered terms. You can either pray they don't alter the deal further, or get the fuck out, abandoning your chat history and social connections.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#285

Post by Zelphyr »

It has been said that companies that build rely too heavily on the public, free API’s of another service are doomed when that service decides to monetize those API’s. See, for example, API users of Google Maps.

I think we are now at the point where this applies to individuals. If a person or group of people rely too heavily on a single free service then they’re going to feel pain when that service finally decides to monetize.

There are no free lunches. All these “free” products out there that seem great have Venture Capital investors waiting until the day that the service reaches a critical mass and they can flip the cash-generating switch.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#287

Post by reimertz »

We need to kill the idea that user growth is a replacement for a honest and legit business model.

This is not just a founders problem - investors are equally compliant since they keep on throwing their money as long as they see that sweet exponential curve.

Once they get tired of seeing their money being lit on fire; they give the founders one option; monetize what you have or shut down.

Since users are now used to your service being free, the only thing you can do is to look at what you have; User data.

At first, you just sell this info to your “trusted” partners because you want to be able to sleep at night, but as the revenue keeps on growing, your investors realize you have a money printing machine at your hands.

At this point you you’ve lost your compass and forgot why you even founded the thing, being stuck at a big table discussing with investors and lawyers how to find loopholes in the new iteration of the GDPR laws, ending the meeting with deciding to funnel a big chunk of cash to lobby the law out of existence.

At this point, everybody looses except from the stock owners. Or maybe you find it hard to sleep at night, because even thought you now have infinite amounts of cash, you lost a part of yourself that day when you threw your entire user base under the bus.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#288

Post by im3w1l »

lifty wrote: post #207
jsinai wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure the network effect is strong but let’s not forget how WhatsApp got here in the first place: people installing a strange new app, often shared by their friends via a text message invite link. I remember sitting in a circle with a group of friends one night 10+ years ago while each of us installed WhatsApp and had our first conversations on the app. It was a time when BBM was dominant and cross-platform messaging…

Whatsapp had to compete with SMS, so when I was introduced to WhatsApp I thought it was a godsend and immediately adopted it. Also advertised it to all my friends. Switching now might be harder because there is a lot less to gain, besides some non-tangible “privacy”. What is this thing called “privacy”?

Facebook is a private company. Freedom of speech doesn't mean they are obligated to give you a megaphone for asking your mom how she is doing. They can and do ban people for any and no reason, cutting you off from your social network at a moments notice.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#289

Post by golemiprague »

srfvtgb wrote: post #27
frereubu wrote: post #22

I'd love to give up WhatsApp, but network effects are key here. I tried moving my extended family off WhatsApp onto Signal a couple of years ago and it failed miserably because the app wasn't nearly as easy to use, and they had all their friends on Whatsapp. Has anyone here had any success moving a large group of people onto something like Signal or Telegram? If so, do you have any tips?

Fortunately I don't live in a place where WhatsApp is completely pervasive. I personally had luck saying "if you want to contact me use Signal, iMessage or at the very least SMS" and when people asked why, I would cite Cambridge Analytica.

How do you use iMessage if you got android phone? I hate this thing, would rather give my data to facebook then use it because it creates class separation between poor and rich. I have seen it with my kids who wanted iphone because they couldn't communicate with all the iphone kids who used iMessage. That's in itself much worst to me than some privacy which i already gave up on.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#290

Post by noncoml »

endless1234 wrote: post #160
noncoml wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you live in US, the number has to be probably close to $30/month to match what FB is making out of you

How do you come to that number? $30 per month from WhatsApp alone? This source seems to think it's closer to $30 per year per user for the whole of facebook: https://www.statista.com/statistics/234056/facebooks-average...

For US users: https://market.us/statistics/social-media/facebook/

Is it per year? Per Quarter? Not clear to me.

But yeah, definitely not per month, but also much higher than the $1/year the GP is offering.

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